


Primeval 100 Drabbles: 501-550

by Annariel



Series: Primeval 100 Drabbles [11]
Category: Primeval
Genre: Community: primeval100, Drabble, Drabble Collection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-11
Updated: 2017-11-16
Packaged: 2018-09-07 22:09:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 50
Words: 5,001
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8818021
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Annariel/pseuds/Annariel
Summary: A mixture of drabbles for prompts drawing from all of the Primeval series.





	1. Chapter 1

Abby swore quietly.

"What is it?" Connor asked.

"I've got Becker in the Secret Santa. What does he like apart from guns and tanks? Both cost more than 10 pounds."

"A toy tank?"

In short order a small tank and five soldiers took up residence on Becker's desk. The following year they were joined by three matching soldiers with a bazooka, and the year after by an aeroplane.

The year after that, Connor having been assigned, a T-Rex arrived.

Becker retreated into his office. From behind the closed door someone said "break out the bazookas!" followed by "call the airforce!"


	2. Keeping Warm

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 502

Jenny rubbed her hands together. She had fallen in the snow while herding an Eohippus and her gloves and socks were both soaking wet.

"Huddle together for warmth?" Stephen offered.

"In your dreams," Jenny said automatically.

"If you don't accept, Cutter may attempt chivalry."

Jenny laughed at a mental image of Nick being clumsily solicitous.

"Seriously, you look frozen. Supervise from the car."

Jenny realised suddenly that Stephen was in deadly earnest.

"OK and send Connor for some coffee. I don't think he even tried to dress for the weather."

"Good idea, Connor is next on my rescue list anyway."


	3. Christmas Dinner

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 503

Becker didn't do Christmas, but he did like a quiet day at work, not to mention the pay.

He _was_ surprised to find Jess Parker there.

"I don't do Christmas," she said in a tone of voice he recognised and so dropped the subject.

Still, since they were there... a little ingenuity bagged them Christmas napkins, half a dozen mince pies and a bottle of non-alcoholic mulled wine from the canteen. Jess made paper hats from coloured paper. They ate their sandwiches by the ADD, microwaved the mince pies and the mulled wine and toasted `Merry Christmas'.

Best Christmas ever.


	4. New Year Resolutions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 504

"The anomaly was in a children's hospital which the Queen was visiting," Jenny said.

Lester winced. "What did Cutter do?"

Jenny smiled. "At the New Year party last night he publicly made a resolution to endure monarchy with civility. I don't think he expected to be held to it so soon."

"Something to be thankful for. What about the second anomaly?"

"Stonehenge."

"I suppose it's too much to hope that Lyle resolved to stop trying to flatten the place."

"The opposite, I'm afraid. I think the precise words were, `This year I'll make sure that fucking ancient monument gets it'."


	5. Taboo

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 505

Becker knew, from the report, what had happened to Stephen Hart. But the report didn't explain why Hart had been operating alone which seemed important to understanding what went wrong.

Becker tried asking Cutter who beligerently announced he was busy.

Becker noticed that all traces of Stephen Hart had been removed. It wasn't obvious where the man's desk had been, or his locker, or which had been his mug. He only heard the name mentioned once and everyone fell into embarrassed silence afterwards.

Miss Lewis eventually explained. Becker decided to respect the silence but he didn't think it was healthy.


	6. The Stone Age

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 506

"Connor down your phone!" Abby said.

"But I'm just catching an Aerodactyl!"

"I don't care. There's something coming through the anomaly now!"

"Someone I think," Emily said.

* * *

"This is incredible! There's so little neolithic cave art in the UK!"

James Lester tried to contain his excitement. He let his torch play along the wall of the cave they had just opened up. It depicted a hunting scene.

"Oh Fuck!" Lyle said. "We're going to have to D-notice it."

"Why?" Lester moved over to him and then swore.

"I'm going to kill Connor," Lyle said.

The cave men were hunting pokemon.


	7. University

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 507

The Dean was in the middle of trying to fight the latest fire Professor Cutter had set: missing a staggering five lectures in a row, shouting at three students in public and failing an entire module. 

The terse email from the Head of Science read: `The government want to buy out some of Cutter's time.`

The Dean wondered if he had a fairy godmother. They could keep Cutter's research (badly needed for any hope of a decent REF result) but shuffle him out of teaching without too bad an effect on morale.

The Dean's email in reply simply read: `Pub?`


	8. The Solar System

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 508

It was raining. Since the anomaly had considerately opened in a car park, the team had opted to observe from the inside of their vehicles. Stephen, squashed into the back of Abby's Mini, found he was forced to listen to Connor's latest theory about the anomalies.

"In June 2010 all these planets will line up, with the Earth perpendicular like this," Connor was sketching frantically on the back of an envelope.

"And why will that affect anything?" Abby asked. 

"Think about the gravitational forces!"

Abby made a noise suggesting she disagreed but lacked the physics to argue. Stephen silently agreed.


	9. The Home Office

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 509

Claudia scrubbed at her silk blouse a final time before giving up. The mixture of mud and blood was not coming out.

"That's the fifth shirt this month!" she said.

"Do you need to wear such nice stuff in the field?" Ryan asked.

"I can't represent the Home Office in jeans and trainers."

Claudia wrung the shirt out viciously and dumped it in the bin.

"I already hate the expense claim form," Claudia sighed again. "When I applied to the Home Office I did not anticipate that blood-stained clothing would be one of the regular minor irritations of the job."


	10. Marriage

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 510

Helen used to tell people she and Nick had eloped.

That wasn't technically true. They had driven up the M6 to Gretna Green as a laugh and then, when it became clear that these days there was paperwork, had done so again a few weeks later because why not?

Helen wasn't on speaking terms with her parents and Nick's were dead so they didn't see the need for guests.

For years Nick had a slightly blurred polaroid of the wedding thanks to a bemused Japanese tourist. But it vanished when he came back through the anomaly and everything had changed.


	11. New Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 511

"When we get home..." had been a mantra during that year in the Cretaceous.

"When we get home I'll spend a week just watching TV and eating Ice Cream."

"When we get home I'm going to take the longest bath ever."

But _when_ they got home all was new. The flat had been packed up and re-let. The ARC had moved. The faces were different. 

It was only after spending a short but desperate time in the future that Connor and Abby returned home again and this time felt able to look about themselves and say with confidence, "We're home."


	12. In the Beginning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 512

_In the beginning God created the heaven and the Earth_

Emily's father had occasionally enjoyed a lively debate about how much of the Old Testament was fact versus allegory but no one doubted that first sentence. It was thus a shock to discover, a mere 150 years later, that everyone she worked with apparently viewed it as obviously false. Emily, so unconventional in her own time, discovered herself to be conservative.

She was touched therefore when, late one Saturday after a difficult shout, Becker said, "My Church is having a `bring a friend' service tomorrow, would you like to come?"


	13. Second Chances

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 513

Nick sat on a rock under the Permian sun and watched Connor take readings and make calculations. They'd been over the ridge to retrieve the bodies of Ryan and his men but found nothing. Those events were yet to happen.

"Done," Connor said triumphantly.

"Want to let me in on the excitement?"

"This anomaly is periodic, when it's open it oscillates between timelines. If you go through just now you'll reach the Claudia timeline!"

Connor's expression was half excitement and half fear. Nick thought of Jenny waiting anxiously in one future. It seemed he had a choice between second chances.


	14. Ouch!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 514

"You don't have to be all manly. You can tell me if things hurt!" Jess flopped down on the couch next to Becker and stared at him with wide concerned eyes.

Becker considered this. He tried to consider it carefully from all angles but the frankly industrial amounts of pain-killer in his system made this difficult.

Even so, something dimly warned him that "fuck off and leave me to die in peace" was not a good response.

After all, dying was an exaggeration. It was only a broken rib, albeit accompanied by severe bruising and multiple lacerations.

"Ouch?" Becker ventured.


	15. Caught on Camera

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 515

"That was a nightmare." Jenny sank down at her desk.

"I saw the footage," Lorraine said sympathetically.

Jenny sat bolt upright. "What footage! Don't tell me they broadcast it!"

"I think it was live. You're already a meme."

Jenny whimpered. Lorraine eyed the gif on Facebook which showed Jenny declaring firmly that there were definitely no dinosaurs here just as a triceratops ambled up and started munching on her hair.

It was pretty funny, though Lorraine didn't think Jenny would see it that way.

"Student prank, obvious model, etcetera, your team have already submitted it to Snopes.com," Lorraine said comfortingly.


	16. Spring is in the Air

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 516

The winter was not as bad as they had feared. It got colder but there was no snow and rarely any frost. Even so, it was harder to find food. Abby was grateful when one morning she stepped out of the cave and sensed some warmth in the gentle breeze. A nearby a tree was covered in large, pale pink blooms.

Abby breathed long and deep. Even in the Cretaceous, spring had that feeling of freshness and hope. On mornings like this she could believe they would get home, and even believe that if they didn't, things might be OK.


	17. Emily Merchant

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 517

Emily was endlessly surprised that the 21st century could be both familiar and completely different. She had assumed without thought that names worked as they had done in her time.

The first day Abby was back in work after her wedding Emily called her as "Mrs Temple" with a smile and was surprised to be corrected.

"I've not changed my name. I'm still Abby Maitland."

Emily thought about that in the months that followed: considered the meaning of names and identity and finally went to see Lester.

"I'm not Emily Merchant, I'm Emily Somerville. Can you change it for me?"


	18. The Forest of Dean Permian Anomaly

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 518

The Forest of Dean anomaly continued to open irregularly. During one particularly busy period in the 2020s a research centre was even erected near the site.

Soil samples were taken whenever it opened. Someone invariably got sent over the hill to check for graves. Prominent features were gradually catalogued and a timeline created.

Dozens of academic papers were produced, plus a number of popular books.

Nothing, however, prepared anyone for the day an innocuous researcher, came face to face with a spindly blue-faced man who exclaimed, "Oh my God! You must be one of the original 21st century research teams!"


	19. Office Romance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 519

"Luigi's," said Abby, munching on a chip. "Classy but not too ostentatiously expensive."

"It's a bit fancy, don't you think?" 

"It serves pizza, Connor, not quail eggs deep-fried in dry ice."

"You don't actually fry things in dry ice..."

"I'm quite capable of picking a resturant," Becker interrupted.

He was met with dubious stares.

"Jess mentioned something about eating fish and chips in her best dress," Emily said.

"I didn't plan to take her to the chippie! There was a suspected gas leak at the restaurant. This time there will be three back up places on the same street alone."


	20. The Anomaly Detection Device

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 520

"What has happened to my Anomaly Detection Device?" Jess demanded.

She had just come on shift. Wires trailed across the floor and all her screens were dead. She was not surprised to see Connor's legs sticking out from under it.

"It'll be fixed in five minutes! I made a minor modification and things got complicated."

"I'm going to make coffee. Unless everything is back when I return, I'm selling your Wolverine comics on eBay."

There was a noise of someone trying to get up and then banging their head, followed by a squeak.

Jess smiled. She had made her point.


	21. Oliver Leek

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 521

Oliver Leek was extremely surprised, aged 14, to be called into the Headmaster's office and summarily expelled. It turned out that he had been observed putting paint stripper in Jack Day's water bottle.

"He's still in hospital. You are someone was with him," the Headmaster said severely following up with, "but I really don't understand why? Jack is such a good-natured boy."

In Leek's opinion it was far too easy to be good-natured if you were blond and captain of the Rugby team. Jack should try being short and uncoordinated for a bit and see how good-natured he was then.


	22. Connor Temple

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 522

"We kept the contents of your lockers," Lester had said.

Connor didn't remember his locker contents from the day he got trapped in the Cretaceous, but he imagined they would capture a snapshot of his essence.

He found a crumpled Jack Reacher thriller which he vaguely recalled picking up in the rec room; bland jeans and a T-shirt - he had picked his least interesting clothes as his emergency change; and a Mickey Mouse novelty key ring which he didn't recollect at all and was fairly certain wasn't his.

It was disappointing. The contents of the locker defined someone else entirely.


	23. Ethan Dobrowski

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 523

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Partner for Extract from _Anarchism and Trade Unionism: 1848 - 1914_ by O. M. Huges the drabble I wrote last time "Ethan Dobrowski" was the prompt.

"What is this shit?" Ethan asked, throwing the textbook on the table in front of Danny.

"What it says mate. Was that you? It blames Ethan Dobrowski for eight murders and a factory explosion."

"Do you think it was me?"

"I don't fucking know what to think, not now. I'd like an explanation."

"You believe the fancy textbook, but you don't believe me."

"Dear God, Patrick. Sometimes you'd try the patience of a fucking saint. Why the fuck do you think I'm asking you if I don't want your side of the story before I make up my fucking mind."


	24. It's a Dinosaur

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 524

"It's a dinosaur!" Kermit said with barely supressed excitement.

"Actually, pterosaurs split off from the ancestors of dinosaurs in the late Triassic," Connor said.

Kermit's face fell. "Not a dinosaur?"

"Not a dinosaur no, sorry."

* * *

"Is this a dinosaur?" Kermit asked hopefully 

"Sorry, no, dinosaurs are part of a family defined as reptiles more closely related to birds than crocodiles."

"OK, it's definitely a giant, really bad-tempered crocodile. Our luck is lousy today."

"It's called a Deinosuchus, if that makes it any better?"

"Not really, no."

* * *

"Go on! ruin all my illusions."

Connor grinned. "Raptors are definitely dinosaurs."

Kermit whooped.


	25. Christine Johnson

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 525

When Christine Johnson was fourteen she decided she wanted to be Prime Minister.

Her failure to become president of the University Conservative party was a set back, though she was rather pleased with the way her rival spectacularly imploded three months into his term amidst a flurry of scandal that even briefly made it into the national press.

She didn't win the emergency election for his replacement either. Christine decided it would be too risky to generate another scandal. However, she clearly had quite a talent for digging up, and if necessary manufacturing, the dirt which suggested another potential career...


	26. Matt Anderson

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 526

The problem started slowly.

Connor accosted Matt randomly in the corridor and asked him why the chicken crossed the road. Matt was politely bemused.

Then a report he'd been writing vanished from his computer and Jess had to help him recover it, all the while commenting on how anxious and then how relieved he must feel.

Abby launched into a random rant about environmental activism and didn't he feel passionate about this?

Then a procession of dancing clowns paraded through the operations room.

Matt went to find Lyle.

"Tell me about this book you're running on my expressions," he said.


	27. The Future Predators

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 527

The future predators were facing a crisis. On a recent reconaissance to the ARC, Future Predator Sub-prime Seven had returned with a long bendable single double-ended knitting needle found in a toolbox in the lower sub-basement. Its original owner had been sighted muttering something about how the heavenly host always used four needles.

The Future Predator Knitting Circle was now riven with controversery. Were they to side with the angels and continue to make their socks using four needles or remain true to their natures and adopt this new-fangled circlular needle.

The conflict lasted many a long and bloody year.


	28. Stephen Hart

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 528

"You look miserable today," Kath said as she entered the common room.

Helen looked up from the Times Higher. "I have 50 first year Introduction to Evolution essays to mark."

Kath grimaced. "Bad luck. How dire are they?"

"Half of them seem to think humans are descended from chimpanzees and I spent a whole lecture explaining about common ancestors!"

"Never mind. About 10 percent of them won't be completely useless."

"So far only Stephen Hart seems to be capable of putting even a rudimentary argument together."

"Ooh! And he's easy on the eye as well."

"I can't say I'd noticed."


	29. Too Hot to Move

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 529

"So, I'm guessing raptors." Ryan squinted through the heat haze at the small dinosaurs lying on the grass of the playing field.

"They're nothing like raptors," Connor said indignantly. "Much anyway," he added as an after-thought.

"What are they then? and why are they lying around in the heat like that? I thought dinosaurs liked the heat."

"Alaskan Troodon. They probably don't like the heat any more than you do. We should probably try to deal with them before it cools down this evening. Troodon are thought to have been pretty bright for dinosaurs... and omnivorous."

"Oh joy!" Ryan said.


	30. Sarah Page

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 530

Sarah took a shocked breath and nearly choked on the tangy, oily air. There was tarmac beneath her feet, a desolutary Give Way sign before her and an overcast sky above. 

At her back a dry hot breeze blew from the anomaly. A half-finished cup of wine and sweet cakes made from dates and honey stood abandoned on the table in her villa by the banks of the Nile. She had left them when the summons came to the anomaly. 

It started to drizzle. Sarah sighed, smiled, pulled her shawl over her head and started to walk along the road.


	31. Fast Asleep

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 531

"Hi Pete! It's Jenny from the ARC. I've got a story for you."

"Jenny, I'm watching the same twitter posts you are. A diplodocus drank about three gallons of Carlsberg from an over-turned lorry, then went for a merry wander through the Dorset countryside during which time it tried to mate with three barns, a haystack and a UKIP campaign bus before falling fast asleep in the car park of the local Jehovah's Witnesses. You can't come up with a cover story to beat that much comedy gold."

"Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall dresses elephant up as dinosaur while serving psychedelic nettle wine."


	32. Old Friends

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 532

Jenny had been touched to receive an invite to the Temple's daughter's wedding and, after her divorce, she felt the need for a new social circle.

Surrounded by unfamiliar and _terribly young_ faces, Jenny drank champagne and made small talk like the professional she was, while wondering if this had been a mistake.

"Jenny Lewis, as I live and breathe!"

Her heart leapt unexpectedly. Danny Quinn looked older but had the same mischevious twinkle. She clinked her glass against his and felt suddenly at ease.

"Danny! What have you been doing with yourself?"

He laughed. "How long have you got?"


	33. Scars

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 533

The doorway to the other world opened irregularly, but always in the same place, half way up the great mountain.

A council was convened among all the local villages that had suffered when some strange creature came out of the doorway.

It took a generation to carve out the thick slabs of stone, haul them up the slope and erect them over the place, but eventually it was done. The mining and the hauling and the construction left a great scar on the landscape, but it would be gone in time as the wounds of the people healed in turn.


	34. Central Metropolitan University

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 534

"We're hoping to develop strong research themes across Earth Sciences, Zoology and Archeology..."

Nick allowed himself to zone out. This was the third university bigwig to give him the hard sell. He was a little doubtful about CMU's offer. They were promising a lot of research resource but Nick was concerned about teaching load.

"Are you fallilng for the honey trap?" asked a low husky voice.

Helen Ambrose was lounging in a door. He'd heard on the grape vine that CMU had made her an offer.

"Are you?" 

Dr. Ambrose smiled. "Let's meet for a pint later and compare notes."


	35. Dinner Date

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 535

A knock on Lester's door made him look up. A glance at Lorraine's apologetic face told him the worst.

"I have a dinner date with my wife at 7pm. Tell me that whatever it is won't make me late."

Lorraine grimaced, "Cutter has encountered the Queen again."

"Where?" Lester asked after a pause.

"Royal Ascot."

"Did he frighten the horses?"

"I'm afraid so sir. Should I phone your wife?"

"No, I'll call, for all the good it will probably do."

Lester gloomily turned the ring on his finger. He had a horrible feeling this was one missed dinner too many.


	36. James Lester

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 536

"This month's expense claims," Lorraine said, placing a pile of forms on Lester's desk.

The top one was in a new hand. "Ah! Mr. Quinn's. I wonder what new sort of torment our latest recruit will provide?"

Lester skimmed the form. It was a masterpiece of staying just on the right side of totally unreasonable.

"He said something about being used to expense claims from the police."

Lester signed it. "I have a horrible feeling my staff are slowly training me to accept increasingly outrageous claims."

"At least they actually submit forms now, instead of sending outraged emails demanding payment."


	37. Danny Quinn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 537

During the wedding breakfast, Jenny and Danny found themselves at a table with a smattering of ARC employees so they were able to talk relatively freely. Danny's tale was funny, terrifying and outrageous --sometimes all three at once.

"I don't believe for a moment that you had a pet Triceratops!" Jenny hissed.

"Ask Candida," Danny winked across the table at the ARC's chief vet.

Candida waved an airy hand. "We had her in with the Mammoth for a bit. Good natured but, well, large."

"And Patrick?" Jenny asked tentatively.

Danny's face darkened momentarily.

"He ended well," he said at last.


	38. Rex

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 538

It involved a lot of paperwork and even more political wrangling on Lester's part to little apparent avail.

Abby liked to pretend that the deciding factor was her competance, saving 300 children when an anomaly opened at a school the minister was visiting. However she had a suspicion it was the fact she found him wimpering under a desk, some time after all was over.

"About my Coelurosauravus Rex..." she asked as he emerged.

"For God's sake woman, just take the damn lizard back and be done with it!"

Then he straightened his tie and went to meet the Press.


	39. Arch Nemesis

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 539

Freddy Granger had the cheerful demeanor of the wealthy and sporty. He wasn't a bully, but he was thoughtless and inclined to laugh when Leek did something foolish.

He also beat Leek to the Maths prize every year from the lower fourth to the upper sixth.

Leek felt a small rush of pleasure, therefore, when he saw Freddy mannning a trade stall for computer equipment. Leek could feign interest and then withdraw the lucrative ARC contract. He walked over, preparing his best false smile.

"Freddy!" he said.

Freddy's expression was blank. Leek, crushed, realised his arch nemesis didn't remember him.


	40. Ready, Aim, Fire

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 540

Jenny took a deep breath as the raptor charged towards her. She'd practised with the gun in the range at the ARC, as they all had, but this was the first time she'd been out in the field with nothing between her and a dinosaur except 4 kg of aluminum, steel and plastic.

In her peripheral vision she could see Becker running and shouting. He wouldn't reach her in time.

With a strange sense of calm, she looked through the sight, lined up the pointer with the center of the raptor, braced herself against the kickback and pulled the trigger.


	41. In a Dark, Dark Wood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Challenge 541

Ryan was woken by the dawn chorus. He washed in the river and then set out to check the traps. 

He wasn't entirely sure when or where he was. He guessed the not too distant past. He recognised many of the animals but the abundance of wildlife suggested there were few, if any humans around. It might have been the Forest of Dean itself, close to the anomaly he'd been knocked through.

He wasn't too worried. The Forest of Dean anomalies all opened regularly. It was spring or early summer. He could survive a few months in the wild wood.


	42. Helen Cutter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 542

Danny did a double-take when he saw the woman propping up the bar. She must have been in her sixties but it was clearly Helen Cutter. She grinned and winked.

"You look surprised to see me," she said.

"A little."

She smirked. "The records in the abandoned ARC were very clear about what happened to me. It didn't seem wise to mess with history too much, or at least not with what got recorded."

Danny thought about that. "What about Nick and Stephen?"

Helen raised an eyebrow. "Well, you'll have to ask them, but I do like to be thorough."


	43. Evan Cross

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 543

Angelika Finch privately thought of her job as "genius wrangling". Evan Cross made the technology but she made the company. Without her, Evan's baby company would have gone bust then been taken over. Evan would have fallen out spectacularly with the new management and stormed off.

Evan told her that he understood and appreciated all she did, but she wasn't certain that he really did. She was one of his team who he needed to look out for, protect and rescue not an equal partner. The more she felt like that, the more she felt she needed to get away.


	44. Jess Parker

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 544

ARC level 1 was for all security clearances. It wasn't really a problem, but people on level 1 did tend to assume Jess was Lester's PA.

"You should tone down your look," one of the receptionists told her. "It looks unprofessional. Could hold you back."

Jess bit back the urge to tell him she ran incredibly complex operations for an elite team so he could stuff his conservative attire where the sun didn't shine.

She did derive some private satisfaction when Lester sauntered over and said, "Not as much as being late three times this week will hold you back."


	45. Abby Maitland

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 545

Jess had told Abby about Connor's backdoor password. The words `Abby Temple' clerly meant a lot to him. And yet...

And yet when a hapless administrator dropped by her desk to ask about changing the ARC records she took a deep breath, smiled and said, "No, actually I'll be keeping my maiden name."

The woman just nodded, smiled and moved along until Connor called out.

"But actually, I'll be changing my name," he caught Abby's eye, "if that's alright with you."

"It's not the name that's important" he said later that night, "just that it's the same. That we're family."


	46. The Anomalies

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 546

Nick often dreamed of the anomalies, particularly after he started mapping them. He dreamed of them spiralling off into space on paths all their own, like comets eliptically moving out and then returning to the Earth. He sometimes wished he had more of a talent for mathematics. He could plot their progress, like a mariner with a compass and a chart, but the formula for describing their motion or predicting the paths of those not already mapped eluded him. At other times he was glad he could simply enjoy the dream of their vast cosmic ballet for its aesthetics alone.


	47. Mammoth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 547

Lester generally paid attention when Abby asked for a meeting for it happened rarely. Once upon a time she would have slouched casually in his office, but her clenched hands would have betrayed her nerves. Today she stood tall and composed. Lester quietly marvelled at the woman she had become.

"Connor has predicted an anomaly to Pliocene Columbia."

Lester saw the determined set to her jaw and recognised she was prepared for a fight. He had one of those moments where he wondered if he overplaying his capriciousness.

"Well," he said, "we should all be there to send Monty home."


	48. Remember

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 548

Jamila did her best to close the ARC securely. She made copies of the most vital files in as many different media as she could, placing them in sealed metal boxes.

At one point, the names of the dead had been inscribed on a wall in the entrance foyer. Jamila had neither the time nor resource to update it. She left a written record in another box at its foot.

She bolted the doors and turned South. There were rumours of clearer air and fewer predators in that direction.

She would remember and hoped that, in time, others would too.


	49. Convergence

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 549

Following convergence, there was an enquiry. In fact there were multiple enquiries, both internal and external, but only the first threatened reputations and careers. Jenny gave evidence at that first one and was impressed that Lester got out of it with a commendation and continued control of the ARC. She could recognise a stitch up when she saw one, and Lester was intended as scapegoat.

She met him at an art gallery opening several weeks later and said as much.

Lester smiled blandly. "Over a long career, I somehow fell into the habit of documenting my objections to ministerial decisions."


	50. Philip Burton

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 550

Richard Carswell, head technical scientist at Prospero Dorset was bright, ambitious and most importantly resourceful. Burton's secretary had mentioned that the Dorset lab had been closed because of a gas leak and Burton had dismissed the information from his mind. Now he was reading a very interesting report from Carswell which suggested an entirely different exxplanation involving creatures, special forces and, most importantly, some extremely interesting anomalous readings from several pieces of equipment.

Burton googled sightings of dinosaurs in the Home Counties. Less than an hour later he emailed an associate at Whitehall to ask about the Anomaly Research Centre.


End file.
